Ali Luciani, Campus Carrier asst. arts and living editor

Every year, Berry College hosts Solidarity Week, a student-led initiative that highlights themes such as belonging and education. This week provides opportunities for the community to learn, reflect and grow together through conversations. This year’s focus on “protecting one’s peace” invites students and faculty to consider how self-awareness, boundaries and resilience are important to maintain peace in everyday life.

Solidarity Week includes Berry Circles, smaller conversations that create space for talking to others and listening. Members of the Office of Belonging and Community Engagement and the Good Neighbor Center ensured the week’s events ran smoothly.

Phillip Edge, director of LifeWorks, said that conversations like this matter.

“With everything happening in the world nowadays, it’s important to be in a place where you can be centered, grounded and stable,” said Edge. “For me, if we cannot protect those boundaries, our peace is going to be totally thrown off. And that’s not going to be helpful for us individually, collectively or as a Berry community.”

Former NFL player and author of “Protect Your Peace”, Trent Shelton, came to Berry and set the tone for the week with his message on resilience and self-awareness. The event encouraged students to connect Shelton’s message to their own lives.

Edge said that Shelton’s relatability made his message effective.

“Truth be told, I don’t know if he said anything we haven’t heard before, but he gave it to us in such a relatable way that it made sense for all of us,” Edge said. “That’s why it landed.”

The questions used in Berry Circles were designed by the Office of Belonging and Community Engagement student team, drawing both from Shelton’s message and the theme of peace.

“We wanted to engage with Trent’s ideas, but also speak to the larger Berry community,” Edge said. “Our job was to create a space where people felt safe to share and connect the dots.”

The discussions revealed similarities across students and faculty. For Edge, listening to participants reminded him of how much the community has in common.

“One of my key takeaways was that we’re a lot more alike than we think,” Edge said. “Many of the answers were very similar and that showed me whether we’re students or faculty, a lot of us are still figuring out what peace looks like in our lives.”

The shared struggled students expressed highlight why conversations about peace are impactful.

“People were able to walk away saying, ‘It’s not just me. I’m not the only one struggling with boundaries.’ Being able to have those conversations in a safe space really helped,” Edge said.

Solidarity Week is not only about conversations, it’s also the result of planning from dedicated student leaders. Senior Quanah Martin, president of the Berry Brotherhood and part of the Solidarity Week planning team, reflected on his position this week. Although he did not play a direct role in securing Trent Shelton as the keynote speaker, Martin supported the event’s logistics, including coordinating entrances for students and community members, managing CE credit check-ins and preparing to lead discussions after Shelton’s keynote.

“Despite the chaos and stress of organizing, the result of this week has been super impactful,” Martin said. “This is the week where we actually get to see all of our hard work pay off.” Martin said how organizing and working with his team members have affected him.

“It has allowed me to learn how to operate within a team, not only operating with a team, but also delegate tasks and have tasks delegated to me,” Martin said. “It’s also about facing challenges and turning them into opportunities.”

Martin offered a perspective shaped by resilience on what “protecting your peace” means to him.

“For me, protecting my peace is being comfortable with being uncomfortable,” Martin said. “There are times when things are out of my control, but I still have to be okay with whatever is going on in my life. As long as I am protecting my mindset in the face of negativity or challenges, I will maintain my peace.”

Martin hopes students will walk away from Shelton’s message with tools they can apply to their own lives.

“He’s been through a lot, and his experience facing adversity can be super helpful to others. He’s even written a book on protecting your peace. I hope students find ways to take what he has learned from his life and apply that to our own,” said Martin.

For students who helped organize this week’s events have provided something more important than logistics experience. It has provided a sense of belonging. Senior Taylor Berkbigler described her first time at the Berry Circles as both welcoming and impactful.

“It was really cool,” Berkbigler said. “It was my first time going and it was a very welcoming environment. I went in there, didn’t really know anybody, and then I saw people that I knew. It was a really good experience.”

Berkbigler said the discussion questions tied directly into the week’s theme of peace.

“The questions themselves incorporated peace, and it was about being able to talk openly with one another and feel heard. I think everyone should go,” Berkbigler said.

Through Shelton’s keynote, Berry Circles and the dedication of student leaders, Solidarity Week highlighted peace as a practice that can shape how we approach our daily life. Peace is something Berry students must choose every day. With the help of Solidarity Week, students have the space and support to make that choice with resilience and confidence.